The Private Universities Land Reduction Amendment Bill was passed by the Tamil Nadu government on the final day of the Legislative Assembly, without major debate, amid strong opposition from PMK and CPI members.
On Sept. 7, the final day of the Assembly’s budget session, and on the very same day that the Chief Minister’s fiery speech on Monday morning was being made viral on social media and in the media by TVK members, the TVK government quietly passed the Private Universities Bill.
In the film, Vijayakanth would pretend to throw a banana peel there and then toss it somewhere else. Likewise, at a time when fiery speeches had the entire people of Tamil Nadu hurling opposing views about MISA, Sarkaria, and jaw-breaking, several bills were passed in the Assembly.
One of them was the Private University Amendment Bill. This bill is apparently nothing new. The previous DMK government had also brought in this bill but, due to opposition, abandoned it without passing it.
What is the background behind the growing opposition to the Tamil Nadu government’s 2026 amendment to the Tamil Nadu Private Universities Act?
To establish private universities, a minimum of 100 acres of land is required, and the Tamil Nadu Private Universities Act, 2019 states that the organization setting up the university must establish a Rs. 50 crore endowment fund to meet the expenses of dissolving the private university. As recommended by the task force appointed by the government to amend such provisions, changes have now been made.
Taking into account the shortage of land in Chennai, the government has decided that 12 acres of land are required to establish a private university, 18 acres in other municipal corporations and municipalities, and 25 acres in rural areas.
Moreover, it has also reduced the minimum trust fund required to establish a private university. PMK member Ganesh Kumar said this amendment would encourage the privatization and commercialization of higher education.
This amendment has faced strong opposition among educators and social activists.
As the PMK member said, higher education is already becoming commercialized across the country. In Tamil Nadu, colleges and universities are already operating on a large scale. In Chennai, school and college buses run almost on par with city transport buses. Therefore, because it is only 12 acres, there is a possibility of universities coming up within Chennai. This is certainly not good for today’s congested Chennai.
Therefore, it is said that approval for a university should not be given merely by measuring the land area; there should also have been guidelines on where it can be located.
If 100 acres of land in Chennai is an impossible thing, then only half of that should be prescribed. Instead, how can it be reduced to one-tenth? Fine, then won’t colleges already operating on 12 acres of land now seek to become universities? If colleges functioning under a state university are turned into private universities, it is students and parents who will be affected.
When the land area and endowment required to establish such a university are made easier, won’t that pave the way for anyone to create private universities that are driven purely by profit and not by education, and that are of poor quality?
Just as grand openings of one store each are held in major market areas, private universities will now also be opened. Even if private universities are opened in rural areas, it cannot be brushed aside by saying that students’ difficulty in coming to the cities will be reduced. Private universities will certainly not set tuition fees according to the economic situation of rural students. When private schools operating with very few teachers have already mushroomed like fungi, one after another along the roads, making education fees unaffordable, there is now fear that private universities will also spring up to compete with them.
Although government officials say that 12 acres was determined by calculating the amount needed to set up classrooms, student hostels, sports complexes, laboratories, parking areas, open spaces, sports training facilities, a cafeteria, space for future expansion, art halls, conference halls, and the like for a university, and even though they say this initiative was made solely to establish universities in rural areas and not to convert private colleges into universities, educationists have said that this private university amendment, passed so hastily, without any information, and silently on the last day, will serve as a gateway for large corporations to enter the education sector. They have stated that the chances of it benefiting students, especially poor and underprivileged rural students, are very limited.